Fucking Awesome Experiences

There are only a few things in life that really matter:

• Relationships – Do you have deep, meaningful relationships with awesome people?
• Experiences – Do you consistently have amazing experiences?
• Contribution – Do you make a meaningful contribution to this world?

The rest doesn’t matter.  Money, possessions, status – even health.  They are all building blocks – use them if they serve you in developing and maintaining meaningful relationships, help you have amazing experiences, or allow you to build a real world contribution.  I’ll wax poetic on this triumvirate some other time – today I’d like to relate a fucking awesome experience.

Why Experiences Matter

Most people live a boring life.  They avoid extraordinary experiences.  In addition to being extraordinary these experiences are uncomfortable.  They take extra effort.

What’s easier?

Skiing: Take a trail down or hire a guide and head off into the backcountry?

Nightlife: Hang out with your friends or walk up to someone awesome and start a conversation?

Alternately, which is likely to lead to a fucking awesome experience?

I’ll give you an example of mine from last weekend.  I took the extraordinary fork this time – but it wasn’t easy.

First to see the Sun Rise in America

Last Friday we rafted the Penobscot with Northern Outdoors.  It was an awesome day.  A beautiful river with some sweet Class V rapids right under Mt. Katahdin in Maine.  We had planned to hike Katahdin Saturday morning – 6am start.  But I heard an interesting fact – our guide mentioned that the peak of Katahdin is the first place in the US to see the sun rise.  Hike at night and see the sunrise?  Impossible – Baxter State park goes on lock-down and doesn’t let you night hike.  Or – that just makes the experience more extraordinary… and our guide had heard that the physical gates only *look* locked – but if you are in the know you can pop the pin and drive on through at any time of night.

Small detour. As a mountain and wilderness enthusiast – I really disagree with Baxter State Park acting like my parent.  No night hiking.  They close trails in bad weather.  Until recently relaxed winter hiking required minimum group sizes, gear checks, and other BS.  It’s public land and I have a god-damn right to climb it at night in a storm with no shoes if I like.  And like in Europe – I should pay for my rescue if I need one.

So a beautiful night hike with no crowds and cool temperatures, followed by being the first to see the sun rise, and I get to stick it to the man at the same time?  Count me in!

Now is the part where it isn’t easy to have amazing experiences.  Skipping a night of sleep and hiking in the dark are inevitable consequences of a night hike.  But what about popping the gate open to get into the park, sneaking past two ranger station in the dark, arranging an elaborate car shuttle, and then sneaking past a ranger the next morning in the broad light of day?  That makes it hard.  And memorable.  And fucking awesome.

So What?

Ok Ben – you had a nice hike.  Great – why are you blogging about it?

I would like to find a way to systematically create amazing experiences.  I’m still in experimental stage here – here are some important ideas:

Recognize the Ebbs and Flows

It would be impossible and indeed undesirable to have extraordinary experiences all the time.  Respect the natural flow of energy – periods of intensity need to be followed by restoration.  Manage your energy.

Many times I have allowed myself to fall into this trap.  Going out for a night?  Better make it the BEST NIGHT EVER.  Hitting the gym?  BEST WORKOUT EVER.  You get the point.  This leads to burnout and disappointment.  Let the ordinary be ordinary and save up energy for when you really need it.

Surround Yourself with Fucking Awesome People

It’s been said (by James Rohn) that ““You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” I don’t buy it completely – but if you are surrounded by people who seek the comfortable and shit all over suggestions that could lead to fucking awesome experiences – you aren’t going to have any.

Put the Health Building Blocks in Place

If you are sick, tired, weak, or depressed you will seek what is easy and comfortable.  So put the building blocks in place for awesome experiences by being healthy and energetic.  That way you can use that energy to take advantage of momentary windows of opportunity.

Track Awesome Experiences

Something that gets measured gets managed – so perhaps tracking your awesome experiences is warranted.  It would be time consuming and pointless to track all of your experiences (was watching that movie a 55 or a 60?).  Just track the extreme awesomeness.  Did you hit a 95+ with an experience?  Track it.  Try to drive the numbers up – and certainly see if they start flagging.  You could use something like HealthMonth to help motivate you.

Plan Awesome

Some awesome will be spontaneous – but you can also plan awesome.  Always wanted to see your favorite punk-band tour in Germany?  Make it happen.  Combing this with tracking – perhaps plan out one awesome experience a month – and let the rest happen serendipitously.

Build a Skill Set

There are certain skills that will allow you to maximize opportunities that are placed in front of you.  Having no fear of rejection, putting your heart and brain in sync, being able to cold read people, having child-like adaptability.  Building an awesome tool kit will lead to awesome experiences.

So go ahead and have some awesome experiences.  And let me know how you did it.

Post Script – The Sunrise Myth

I learned after the fact that the Katahdin sunrise actually isn’t the first.  It’s an alluring myth – but at this time of the year Mars Hill gets the sun first.  But was anyone standing on Mars Hill?  It has no trails to the top… so I’m going to go with no.  So my climbing partner Riley and I are still the first to see the sunrise.  Boo-yeah.